Etymology of some Names of Places, by R. Carr-Ellison. 243 



accounted for by the naked elements of head and hope. But 

 it stands forth as very strong evidence, that our Anglian 

 geographical hope had developed itself by assuming the 

 augment, in the same manner as various other geographical 

 or territorial words, such as beorg, hill ; gebeorg, hills col- 

 lectively, or lofty hills ; feld, a field ; gefeld, fields-collectively, 

 a plain ; dal, a part ; gedal, a portion ; eard, ge-ard, mcere, a 

 limit ; gemwre, a border-line. And where three or more 

 hopes, or small dales, were observed to converge, we may be 

 right sure that the term gehope would be in use. The same 

 principle runs through the German tongue, as every German 

 student well knows : and he is familiar with gemoor, a 

 moorland tract, from moor, a moor. The preservation of 

 such a name as Headgehope is strong evidence that gehope 

 was in usage among our Anglian forefathers ; for it appears 

 to be plainly head-gehopa, or heafod-gehopa, " Head of 

 Hopes," or small vales — Linhope, Harthope, and Calderhope. 

 It is satisfactory that an instance of our term Hope in the 

 Anglian genitive plural is actually preserved in the name of 

 a moorland fell, and of a gentleman's seat, in the neighbour- 

 ing county of Durham. About four miles to the southward 

 of Wolsingham, rises a ridge popularly known as Hoppiland 

 Fell, but properly Hopa-land. It is bounded on the north 

 by another Harthope and Harthope-burn ; enduring evi- 

 dence, in common with a whole host of other territorial 

 names, of the numbers and wide diffusion of the hart, or 

 red-deer. On the southern side flows Ayhope-burn, until at 

 Hopa-land Park they converge and meet. Here, then, we 

 have the land of Hopes ; and we may be sure that wherever 

 such descriptive titles were conferred by those who have 

 long passed away, there is a varied and a pleasant picture 

 of dale, and hill, and dell, of heather, birch, and verdure. It 

 remains only to counsel the adoption of Headgehope, as the 

 simplest amended or orthographic spelling. It is by no 

 means unlikely that this is merely an Anglian translation of 

 a preceding British appellation of the mountain. Let us 

 see how it would stand in the ever sweet and picturesque 

 language of the Cymric Britons. Methinks, then, that 

 Headgehope may have echoed to Pen-glynoedd for a 

 thousand years or more, before that Ida established himself 

 at Bamborough, or any but the Celtic races held footing on 

 the heather. 



If 



